One time, I went to school, and they asked us all to find out where our roots were. It's goin' around the class, and the kids were going, 'I'm Swedish-German' or 'I'm English-Irish.' They got to me and I said, 'Pure Kentuckian.'
— John Prine
There's nothing I hate more than canceling shows.
I always had an affinity for older people. I had a job delivering newspapers, and one place I had to go was an old people's home. Some people would introduce you to their neighbors as if you were a nephew or grandson. They didn't get many visitors, so they acted like you were coming to see them. And that stuck with me for a long time.
I think if you write from your own gut, you'll come up with something interesting, whereas if you sit around guessing what people want, you end up with the kind of same schlock that everybody else has got.
Johnny Cash was like Abraham Lincoln to me.
I just like a good, sad song. The sadder, the better. It moves me.
My fans have always taken care of me.
I've been fortunate enough to always have plenty of work, offers to go out and play shows. The hardest thing I have to do is pick out which one I want. For some reason, there's a great demand out there, whether I've got a new record out or not.
When you're singing somebody else's songs, it's just pure joy to me.
I think I've finally, after 72 years, gotten used to my voice, and it sounds like a friend now instead of an enemy.
If I can make myself laugh about something that I should be crying about, that's pretty good.
If somebody tells me to work or exercise, I go the other way. I'll come up with an excuse.
I hate to admit it to my wife, but I only wear two outfits on the road, and then a third one during the day, but I carry about 20.
I take my own syrup, ketchup, and mustard, just in case of emergencies, in my suitcase. Whatever I can steal from the hotels. It's usually Heinz ketchup, and they give you a weird mustard. You don't get French's or anything; you get some sort of Dijon or some mustard. That's just for hot dogs. I don't use mustard for anything else.
In high school, I was a poor student.
I used to read a lot of Steinbeck, and I admired Roger Miller and Bob Dylan.
People keep inventing all these new machines, and producers and recording engineers keep wanting to use them.
I never gave up on 'Archie.' I started picking up 'Archie' comics when I was in my thirties, and then I started subscribing to them.
I'm kind of like the Lone Ranger or Batman. I can just go to my mansion and jump out in my uniform and sing on weekends.
Ignorance is bliss as a writer, I think.
Along the way, we have had some wonderful adventures and have met thousands of dedicated fans - indeed, many of them feel like family to us now.
It's usually drawing on personal experience. I don't think I could dig deep enough trying to get into somebody else's life. Like 'Far From Me' - I wrote it about this waitress that I was dating when I was fifteen or so, and she broke up with me.
I embraced loneliness as a kid. I know what loneliness is. When you're at the end of your rope. I never forget those feelings.
Man, I hated school. I'd stare at the buttons on the teacher's shirt the whole class.
I had a year-round Christmas tree with nothing but colored vinyl 45s hanging on it, like, old Elvis records and stuff.
Never wear your necktie while you're operating a lathe.
The only reason I figured out I didn't like my old records to listen was I could hear how nervous I was and how uncomfortable I was. And who would want to sit around and listen to yourself being uncomfortable?
My sense of humor has saved me more than a couple of times in my life.
I became a recording artist before I knew it. And I just - when I would listen to my old records, I'd just hear this young, extremely nervous fella that that made me want to run out of the room, you know, rather than listen to what he had to say.
I don't like to be caught without a pick.
I did three club tours before I started playing concert halls, and the clubs were half full the first time around.
The more producers I talked to, the more I got looked at like I was crazy for wanting to make a live-sounding album.
Because of my song 'Sam Stone,' a lot of people thought I was interested in writing protest songs. Writing protest songs always struck me as patting yourself on the back.
I sound like that old guy down the street that doesn't chase you out of his apple tree.
For me, there's nothing like performing.
After cancer, I ain't scared of nothing.
When I turned 40, I invited Johnny Cash to my party, even though I knew there was gonna be 200 people roasting a pig and wild as can be. He didn't come, but the next day, I got a bowl of chili he'd made and a note that said, 'John, I'd love to come to your party, but that would mean I would have to leave my house.'
I still enjoy the heck out of getting up there to play shows every night.
I have to have something that really excites me in order to write about it.
I like doing chores.
Howie Epstein was a kind, patient, and extremely talented musician. He took two years out of his life and dedicated his undivided attention to the making of two of my records. Those records changed my life thanks to Howie.
It was always difficult for me to listen to my singing voice for the first 20 years or so. I mean, I really enjoyed singing, and I enjoyed doing live shows, but being in a recording studio and having to hear my voice played back to me would really drive me up the wall.
The best way to write a song is to think of something else and then the song kind of creeps in.
I thought I was grounded. I thought from my kinda blue-collar outlook on life that I would call myself a grounded person. I was not. I was like a balloon flying around in the air. And as soon as our first child was born, boom - my feet came right down to the ground.
Yeah, early '71 is when I got my record contract. I had a record come out by August of '71. Things happened really fast.
I was kind of thrown into - I didn't expect to do this for a living, being a recording artist. I was just playing music for the fun of it and writing songs. That was kind of my escape, you know, from the humdrum of the world.
When I was a boy, my family used to watch a lot of Laurel and Hardy.
'Sam Stone' is a song about futility.
When I'm writing a lyric, things can only get so serious before they start becoming humorous.
I feel basically good about my career because it's remained constant. What I do has never been especially in vogue or gotten high on the charts. At the same time, I haven't had to stop performing any of my music because it aged in style.
